Background: This paper presents finding from a study of the emotional and relational aspects of egg-sharing, exploring egg-share donors' and recipients' thoughts and feelings about each other, about each other's treatment outcome and any resulting children, as well as their attitudes towards disclosure of donor origins and contact between donors and donor offspring in the future. It is the first study of this population since the removal of donor anonymity in 2005.
Methods: A paper or online questionnaire was completed anonymously by 48 donors and 38 recipients who took part in egg-sharing between 2007 and 2009. Data were obtained on a range of measures-including demographics, family circumstances, motivations and anxieties, feelings about egg-sharing, retrospective assessments and views on regulation-and analysed to facilitate cross-group and within-group comparisons of donors and recipients.
Results: This study found very few differences between donors and recipients, as well as between successful and unsuccessful egg-share participants. Donors and recipients expressed sentiments of goodwill towards one another, and displayed attitudes of openness regarding disclosure decisions and future contact among donors and donor-conceived offspring. While some donors and recipients wanted to know the outcome of their donor's/recipient's treatment, others preferred not to.
Conclusions: Most significantly, concerns voiced regarding the potential psychological harm to donors, particularly those whose own treatment ends unsuccessfully, were not borne out by the data.